Speech in the Al Maulid An Nabawi Asy Syarif Cel­e­bra­tions 1439H /​2017: Intro­duc­tory Speech — Draft­ing the Frame­work of Knowl­edge and the Hori­zon of the Future

Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah lived in Makkah Al Mukar­ramah and Al Mad­i­nah Al Munawwarah around the Sahabah who had great minds. Accord­ing to the under­stand­ing and knowl­edge granted to them by Allah Sub­hanah, all of them knew the value of his great self. That was through observ­ing him ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah and through lis­ten­ing to the hon­ourable Quranic verses which descended in stages, thus their hearts accepted them with faith and trans­lated them into action and interaction.

We flip through the pages of Tarikh [his­tory] to exam­ine the great peo­ple who were cho­sen by Allah Ta’ala to be the com­pan­ions of Sayyidul Basyar Al Habib Al Musthafa ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah. We find that their love, respect, hon­our and glo­ri­fi­ca­tion for him were incom­pa­ra­ble to any. We also find that they obeyed him and emu­lated him with­out any hes­i­ta­tion or ques­tion­ing. They had firm Yaqin [con­vic­tion] that Allah Ta’ala has taught His Habib Al Musthafa Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih every­thing that he had not known, and has shown him the begin­ning of human life on earth, the future of his Ummah until the Day of Qiyamah, life after death and every­thing in the skies and the earth. The Sahabah Rid­hwan­ul­lahi ‘Alai­him had faith that he Sol­lal­lahu ‘Alaihi Wasal­lam is a human unlike any other and that he is above all humans. They had faith that he is guarded and pro­tected, that what­ever he sees in any reli­gious mat­ter or worldly affair is purely the truth because Allah Sub­hanah is the One who shows him every­thing, and that what­ever he speaks about any con­di­tion, sit­u­a­tion, event or occa­sion is purely the truth because every­thing he speaks is from Wahyu [rev­e­la­tion] revealed to him. The Sahabah had faith that he is the per­son whom Allah has cho­sen over all His cre­ations and that Allah Ta’ala guards him from every­thing and from every­one, through His words to him:

فَإِنَّكَ بِأَعْيُنِنَا.

[For indeed you are within the watch of Our eyes.] (Surah At-​Thur, verse 48)

After the gen­er­a­tion of the Sahabah, the gen­er­a­tion of Tabi’in began within the Ummah, fol­lowed by the gen­er­a­tion of Tabi’it Tabi’in. All of them did not dif­fer and did not change from the Sahabah. As appar­ent in their words and actions, they were extremely fear­ful to devi­ate even an inch in bear­ing the Amanah [trust] they learnt from the great Sahabah. Thus, their Iman in the unique­ness of Az Zat Al Muham­madiyah [the Muham­madi Self] as a human remained unhurt. Like­wise, their ‘Aqi­dah in the ‘Ismah of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah remained safe from any doubt and far from sep­a­rat­ing between reli­gious mat­ters and worldly affairs.

Then came the 3rd Hijri cen­tury where the era of com­pil­ing and writ­ing books began. ‘Ulu­mul Islam [Islamic Sci­ences] began to form, and writ­ings on Fiqh, Hadith, Tafsir Al Quran and Tarikh emerged. Since then, books became ref­er­ences of knowl­edge and were spread in the hori­zons. This was with­out aban­don­ing the method of “tak­ing ref­er­ence from knowl­edge­able peo­ple” which was the preva­lent and only method dur­ing the pre­vi­ous three cen­turies. Through this rise of knowl­edge and rich­ness of writ­ing, it resulted in some­thing which was later known as “Al Fikr Al Islami” [the Islamic Con­cept], pre­sent­ing itself in the paths of knowl­edge as a ref­er­ence for Ijti­had [deter­min­ing laws in Fiqh] and Taqnin [deter­min­ing laws in ‘Aqidah].

In this cen­tury, fol­lowed by the next few cen­turies, we saw the texts of ‘Ulama writ­ten about “the Actions of An Nabi ‘Alaihi Afd­halus Solati Wa Atam­mut Taslim” in two broad seg­ments; actions in reli­gious mat­ters and actions in worldly affairs. Sub­se­quently, due to the chal­lenges dur­ing those times, they were con­cerned to defend par­tic­u­larly the ‘Ismah of Sayyid­ina Rasulil­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah in mat­ters per­tain­ing to him con­vey­ing rev­e­la­tions from Allah. They achieved a com­plete Ijma’ [con­sen­sus] that his Sun­nah At Tasyri’iyah [Sun­nah in the Imple­men­ta­tion of Laws] Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih was never an Ijti­had but entirely a rev­e­la­tion revealed to him and pro­tected from any mis­take and error. His Sun­nah was indeed one of the pro­tected sources for At Tasyri’ [the Imple­men­ta­tion of Laws]. The ‘Ulama also pre­vented false nar­ra­tions from being inserted in the books of Tafsir, such as the “Story of the Cranes,” on the basis of his ‘Ismah Al Muth­laqah [Com­plete Pro­tec­tion] Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih in reli­gious mat­ters. On the other hand, they did not come to a con­clu­sion on his ‘Ismah Al Muth­laqah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih in worldly affairs.

The dis­cus­sions per­tain­ing to Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah based on ‘Aqi­dah and Fiqh con­tin­ued within the frame­work of selec­tions for knowl­edge and dis­cussed within the scopes of their writ­ings with­out being addressed to the Mus­lims in the gen­eral pub­lic. From the pre­ci­sion of the ‘Ulama and their var­i­ous dis­cus­sions, indeed we feel that they regarded iso­lat­ing the gen­eral pub­lic from the dis­cus­sions and pre­serv­ing their ‘Aqi­dah as an oblig­a­tion of Syari’ah. They also regarded that it was suf­fi­cient for the Mus­lims in the gen­eral pub­lic to ben­e­fit from the prod­uct of the works of the ‘Ulama and have faith with Yaqin that Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is Ma’sum [pro­tected] with an absolute pro­tec­tion that encom­passes Tab­ligh [Con­vey­ing] and Tasyri’ [Imple­men­ta­tion of laws] with regard to reli­gious matters.

As cen­turies passed, the gen­eral pub­lic sub­mit­ted their reli­gious mat­ters and worldly affairs to the ‘Ulama as they trusted the ‘Ulama because those who ascended the throne of knowl­edge would have the cor­rect ‘Aqi­dah in Allah Ta’ala and His Rasul Al Musthafa Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. Fur­ther­more, the dif­fer­ences between their Madzhab and opin­ions were Rahmah for mankind.

After the 7th Hijri cen­tury, a group of ‘Ulama emerged and appointed them­selves to cor­rect the ‘Aqi­dah of Tauhid among the gen­eral pub­lic. Due to that, they chose to remove hon­our­ing An Nabi ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah from the hearts of all the Mu’minin and to empha­size that he was just an ordi­nary human who did right and wrong like all other humans. These ‘Ulama were then fol­lowed by groups of learned peo­ple who were not pro­fi­cient in knowl­edge except in what they had read from their teach­ers’ books. The mat­ter did not only stop at writ­ing books but trans­formed into prop­a­ga­tions and assaults as any­one who did not share their reli­gious views and opin­ions were accused of Bid’ah and Kufr.

Today, we reached an era where the fur­nace is boil­ing. Books, mag­a­zines, tele­vised pro­grammes and uploaded texts are flooded in social net­work­ing plat­forms. Peo­ple are con­fused between ‘Ulama and those who claim to be ‘Ulama. The dif­fer­ence between Usul [roots] and Furu’ [branches], Thawabit [fixed prin­ci­ples] and Mutaghaiyi­rat [vari­ables] dis­ap­peared. Chaos spread per­tain­ing to var­i­ous Fatwa. Every quo­ta­tion of a sacred text to prove fixed prin­ci­ples stands by itself with­out hav­ing a bound­ary based on the objec­tives of the noble Syari’ah and the method of Sayyidul Mur­salin ‘Alaihi Afd­halus Solati wa Atam­mut Taslim when seek­ing clar­i­fi­ca­tion about the religion.

As a result of these con­fu­sions and chaos, the minds of most Mus­lims stopped accept­ing dif­fer­ent per­spec­tives of reli­gious opin­ions and Fatwa of Syari’ah. Most Mus­lims decided to escape from their con­fu­sion by mak­ing judg­ments in their reli­gious mat­ters based on their own per­sonal under­stand­ing. Here, the words of Al Wat­siqah Al Baidha’ are true in describ­ing the sit­u­a­tion, “the Mus­lim becomes either of the two; a Mus­lim who seeks guid­ance from his Taqwa or a Mus­lim who depends on his desire for guidance.”

What is more dan­ger­ous is that when peo­ple become con­fused between ‘Ulama and those who claim to be ‘Ulama in broad­casted pro­grammes, and when major­ity of the gen­eral pub­lic make judg­ments based on their own per­sonal under­stand­ing about reli­gious mat­ters, it cre­ated a break­age between the minds of the ‘Ulama (who have real knowl­edge) and the gen­eral pub­lic among the Mu’minin. When a Mus­lim indi­vid­ual stops tak­ing ref­er­ence from the ‘Ulama, as how we observed the sit­u­a­tion was in the past, he becomes exposed to any­one who is able to pen­e­trate his mind, includ­ing indi­vid­u­als who affil­i­ate them­selves to extrem­ist or ter­ror­ist groups.

In fac­ing this real­ity sur­rounded by dan­ger, we have to ded­i­cate a fourth phase of knowl­edge after the three pre­vi­ous phases. To name them,

The third: The phase of prop­a­ga­tions, accu­sa­tions of Kufr, con­fu­sions and breakage.

We state with full opti­mism and cer­tainty: Indeed, we are prepar­ing our­selves to embark on this fourth phase. We are open­ing the door for intel­lec­tual coop­er­a­tion with sin­cere ‘Ulama, for­mal reli­gious orga­ni­za­tions and vir­tu­ous reformist assem­blies in order to bridge the gap between the minds of ‘Ulama and the minds of the gen­eral Mus­lims. This coop­er­a­tion serves to return the lost trust in most peo­ple per­tain­ing to the pro­gres­sive role of ‘Ulama in the com­mu­nity, and also to gather clear evi­dences and proofs that estab­lish the true ‘Aqi­dah in the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawatullah.

We will never start from scratch, and we will never go into reject­ing the lega­cies of a scholar who glo­ri­fies An Nabi Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih and views him as a human unlike any other. Although we found in his books a few por­tions which fell short of reach­ing the truth, we will not aban­don the numer­ous por­tions he men­tioned which are in line with the clear truth. Indeed, it is a phase that requires the efforts of every­one, whether indi­vid­ual ‘Ulama or Mus­lim assem­blies that have a Fikr [con­cept] and Ru’yah [vision]. It also requires the accu­mu­la­tion of knowl­edge and not dis­card­ing the pos­i­tive con­tri­bu­tions of our pre­de­ces­sors among Al ‘Ulama Al Muhammadiyyin.

Aris­ing from this brief review of the present day and the his­tory, with the per­mis­sion of Allah Ta’ala, in this Mu’tamar, we shall com­mence the fourth phase of knowl­edge with one of the aspects of Al Qad­haya Al Muham­madiyah [the Muham­madi Mat­ters] which form one of the fun­da­men­tal ele­ments of the true ‘Aqi­dah in the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah. It is none other than Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah Al Muth­laqah which encom­passes both reli­gious mat­ters and worldly affairs.

We have orga­nized our Mu’tamar in four scopes. We acknowl­edge that it will never cover all the var­i­ous dis­cus­sions and issues pre­sented across the long his­tory which stretches over thou­sands of pages, and that it will never be pos­si­ble to reach a def­i­nite con­clu­sion on this issue. How­ever, it will at least form the first brick of con­struc­tion, and we hope that its con­struc­tion will be com­pleted over the upcom­ing years. Sub­se­quently, with the per­mis­sion of Allah Ta’ala, it will be pre­sented with the pub­li­ca­tion of a book which we seek from Allah Sub­hanah so that its pages will gather the def­i­nite con­clu­sion which removes the con­fu­sion of most Mus­lims about Al ‘Ismah Al Muth­laqah of Sayyidul Mur­salin ‘Alaihi Ajmalu Solatin wa Atammu Taslim.

The first scope revolves around a topic of para­mount impor­tance and fun­da­men­tal­ity which is “Al Basyariyah Al Muham­madiyah” [the Muham­madi Human Fea­ture], as revealed by Allah Ta’ala in Surah Al Kahfi, verse 110:

قُلْ إِنَّمَا أَنَا بَشَرٌ مِثْلُكُمْ يُوحَى إِلَيَّ.

[Say (oh Rasu­l­ul­lah), “Indeed I am a human like you, who has been revealed to me.”]

This is because after research­ing and exam­in­ing, we found that it forms the first fold line in the enve­lope of Al Qad­haya Al Muhammadiyah.

Hence, if a scholar has a think­ing process which leads him to believe that An Nabi Ar Rasul ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is an ordi­nary human like any other and is prone to mis­takes, errors and other kinds of human weak­ness, and that the human resem­blance indi­cated in Al Quran Al Karim means being equal, he will then reach to a con­clu­sion to doubt the com­plete­ness of Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah. Sub­se­quently, he will begin to read verses of Al Quran Al Karim and occur­rences of As Sirah An Nabawiyah accord­ing to the per­spec­tive that An Nabi Ar Rasul ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is an ordi­nary human like any other but is pro­tected in any­thing that has been revealed to him through Al Quran only. (We shall not stop by their mis­un­der­stand­ing of the term “Basyar” which dif­fers from the term “Insan” where the lat­ter con­tains signs of weak­nesses and shortcomings.)

On the other hand, if a scholar under­stands from the empha­sis of Al Quran that the Basyariyah of An Nabi Ar Rasul ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is an evi­dence that he Sol­lal­lahu ‘Alaihi Wasal­lam is a human who can be seen and con­forms with the char­ac­ter­is­tics of a human such as birth, death, sick­ness, health, mar­riage, anger and con­tent­ment, in other words he is not an angel in a form of a human. His think­ing will then lead him to under­stand that An Nabi Al Ummi ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is a human but unlike any other human through Al Wahyu Al Ilahi [Divine Rev­e­la­tion]. Besides, his mind will not refrain him from believ­ing that Allah Sub­hanah has willed to cre­ate a cre­ation in the form of human whom He guards com­pletely and whom He pro­tects absolutely and totally.

The sec­ond scope encom­passes two top­ics that clearly dis­play the foun­da­tions estab­lished in the first scope. We observe that who­ever sees that An Nabi Al Ummi ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is an ordi­nary human like any other human, he will likely mis­un­der­stand that there are mis­takes in his words and actions with regards to worldly affairs. He will also mis­un­der­stand that Allah Al Jalil Al A’la cor­rects him ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah in the verses of Al Quran.

On the other hand, if a scholar under­stands that Az Zat Al Muham­madiyah is unique in its Basyariyah, he will read the verses of Al Quran and observe the occur­rences of As Sirah An Nabawiyah At Thahi­rah [the Pure Prophetic Sirah] with a dif­fer­ent think­ing process.

The third scope revolves around the topic of “Al ‘Ismah in con­vey­ing rev­e­la­tions”. Although this topic has been con­sen­su­ally agreed upon by the ‘Ulama despite their dif­fer­ent meth­ods, and although they have defended this topic strongly since the 3rd Hijri cen­tury as we have seen, we shall repeat it to com­plete our knowl­edge. Besides, we also see at times that there are signs of resis­tance and sly­ness to defame and attack the ‘Ismah of Sayyid­ina Rasulil­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah even in the aspect of con­vey­ing rev­e­la­tions from Allah Jalla wa ‘Ala.

The last scope of Al Mu’tamar will strive to clar­ify that Al ‘Ismah Al Muth­laqah for Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah is nec­es­sary in terms of reli­gion and logic so that we can trust that the reli­gion which we learn through it to wor­ship Allah Ta’ala today is truly “the reli­gion in the sight of Allah” with­out being affected by even a whis­per of devi­a­tion. Sim­i­larly, Al ‘Ismah Al Muth­laqah is also nec­es­sary in terms of reli­gion and logic so that we can trust that our human Tak­win which we are re-​building to become Tak­win Muham­madi is truly the human Tak­win that pleases and con­tents Allah Subhanah.

I con­clude by saying:

Indeed, Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah to most ‘Ulama is Ma’rifah Ba’diyah [knowl­edge estab­lished after]. This means that the knowl­edge is a result after observ­ing the facts and dif­fer­ences pre­sented for dis­cus­sion (such as Quranic verses which seem to cor­rect him Sol­lal­lahu ‘Alaihi Wasal­lam and Prophetic inci­dents like the inci­dent on the pol­li­na­tion of the date tree). Indeed, Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah to most ‘Ulama is like a “judge­ment” which they make at the end of the ses­sion after study­ing the con­tents and weigh­ing the propo­si­tions and oppositions.

As for us, Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah Al Muth­laqah is ‘Aqi­dah Imaniyah [prin­ci­ple of Iman] that is firmly estab­lished based on its evi­dences. It is Ma’rifah Qabliyah [knowl­edge estab­lished before observ­ing facts and dif­fer­ences], not Ma’rifah Ba’diyah. It is an ‘Aqi­dah that pre­cedes any obser­va­tion of facts and dif­fer­ences. There­fore, Al ‘Ismah Al Muham­madiyah Al Muth­laqah to us is Haqiqah Diniyah [real­ity of the reli­gion] whereby we read all the texts and occur­rences under the roof of ‘Aqidah.